Take a household for example. Dad has his PC, Junior has his PC, and Uncle Bob also has a PC; and all these PCs are connected to the same local network (or LAN for short). With the free D-LAN application these family members can share files over the network and they can communicate with one another over the network (there’s a built-in chat feature).

D-LAN is available for Windows and Linux. As you can see from the Quick Look video that accompanies this article, there is nothing complicated about installing D-LAN on a Windows-powered machine. It must be mentioned here that D-LAN is still in Beta. As a rule of thumb, Beta products tend to be finicky. The developer explained that the current Beta version is for testing purposes only.

Several elements make up D-LAN’s interface: Search, Peers, Log, Main Panel. The Search box, the Peers list, and the Log panel, they can all be detached from the Main Panel. You can arrange them as you see fit on the desktop. Or, better yet, you can put them back on the Main Panel, but in the order you want. You can further customize the visual experience by changing the language (English and French are supported) and by changing the interface style (default or l33t).

From a functionality point of view, D-LAN has the following to offer: no special configuration required; view other users on the network; chat with other users; share files with other users; handy search function; useful log; view uploads and downloads.

D-LAN is free software. But, as mentioned above, it is still in Beta.

Thanks to D-LAN you can communicate and share files with other users on the local network.

Pros D-LAN is available for Windows and Linux. Installing D-LAN on a Windows PC is a simple task. The interface provides support for multiple languages and styles; you can arrange the elements on the interface as you see fit. No special configuration is required to share files and communicate with other users on the LAN. D-LAN is free software.